


The Way We Break [ARCHIVED]

by Rhiannon87



Series: Some Sort of Crazy [ARCHIVED] [6]
Category: Uncharted
Genre: Established Relationship, Estranged Relationship, F/M, Marriage
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2012-05-21
Updated: 2012-05-21
Packaged: 2017-11-05 17:43:29
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 5,703
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/409219
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Rhiannon87/pseuds/Rhiannon87
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>It wasn't supposed to be like this. It was supposed to work this time. Nate and Elena, from Nepal to Yemen. (Revised Oct. 18, 2012, to fix some canon/headcanon issues.)</p>
            </blockquote>





	The Way We Break [ARCHIVED]

**Author's Note:**

> This is the original version of the fic. The revised/rewritten version can be found [here](http://archiveofourown.org/works/6363163).

They've been back in the States for two weeks when Nate tells Elena he loves her.

The various and sundry injuries they picked up during the trip to Nepal have them both stuck at home in recovery; Elena takes a leave of absence from work, and they just hang around his apartment, watching movies and griping about their bruises. Nate's not really planning on saying it, despite Chloe's advice. But one night they're sitting on his couch watching some superhero movie (Elena's choice-- Nate suspects it's because she thinks the lead is hot), her head on his shoulder and his hand on her knee. And the whole thing just feels normal and right, so he turns to press a kiss to her forehead and the words just come out.

“Love you.”

And then he has a moment of pure panic, because he actually said it, loud enough for her to hear. It's not like it's a lie or anything, he does love her, but saying it... makes it real. Makes this whole serious, committed relationship thing real.

Elena raises her head to look at him, and the smile on her face is so bright and perfect that the panic almost goes away. Nate smiles back and leans in to kiss her. “Love you, too,” Elena says, bumping their noses together, and he's not entirely prepared for the way his heart sort of flip-flops to hear her say it. So he kisses her again, because it seems like the thing to do, and wraps his arm around her shoulders. She nestles in against his side and Nate tries not to think about how this changes everything.

*

Nate doesn't quite move in with her when she goes back to her apartment in L.A., but he's usually there when they happen to be in the country. It doesn't happen all that often; her job sends her around the world, and Nate tags along on her trips more often than not. He likes traveling and he's got friends-- or at least, contacts who probably won't poison his drink-- in every city. After a while, though, a pattern emerges. He'll go off to meet with friends, and a couple hours later, she'll get a text saying that he has to “look into something” and he'll be back later, don't wait up for him.

Elena learns pretty quickly that 'don't wait up' refers to days or weeks, not just that night. She sets up her online feeds to notify her of reports about thefts and explosions and spectacularly wrecked vehicles, and she spends the time he's away buried in her work so she doesn't give into panic.

They're in Berlin, about three months after Nepal, when she gets another one of his cryptic texts. And for once, instead of just gritting her teeth and sending back her standard 'good luck, be careful' message, she calls him. “Hey,” Nate says, sounding distracted. “Can this wait? I'm kinda--”

“No, it can't,” Elena says. She walks to the window of their hotel room-- although she supposes it's just hers, now. “Where are you going?”

Silence. “Not far,” Nate replies. “It's not--”

“Why can't you just tell me?” Elena demands, staring out at the lights of late-night Berlin.

Nate sighs. There's a rustling sound, then his voice, muffled, shouting at someone. “Hey, hold up a minute.” Then his voice is back, clear and a little annoyed. “This is probably gonna be... questionably legal,” he admits. “And dangerous.”

“Since when has that been a problem for me?” she asks. “I _know_ what you do, Nate, and I'm here anyway, so why--”

“I don't want you to follow me,” Nate snaps. Elena blinks at his harsh tone. He sighs. “I don't want you getting mixed up in all this.”

She swallows hard. “Fine,” she says, her voice even and flat. “Have it your way. Be careful.”

Nate groans. “Elena--”

Elena hangs up the phone before he can make more excuses, then sets it to silent. She doesn't want to talk to him anymore tonight. She stays up until three researching the members of the EU delegation she's interviewing tomorrow, then goes to sleep in an empty bed.

The lack of missed calls or messages on her phone the next morning shouldn't hurt nearly as much as they do.

*

The thought of losing her makes him crazy. It keeps him up at night, horrible dreams of her death waking him in a cold sweat, followed by hours of sitting awake and watching her breathe. Nate's come so close to losing her in so many ways-- he's seen her almost get shot, almost fall off collapsing bridges, and then that damned grenade... Elena joked about him bawling over her, and while he didn't actually cry, it was the closest he'd come in decades. The choking terror he'd felt when he thought he'd lost her forever-- that's when he knew he was in love.

The trouble is, Elena's smart. Smarter than he is, most days, and if he tells her where he's going or what he's doing when he goes off on his jobs, she'll follow. Because she worries about him, because she knows that she's the one with all the common sense, because she's developed a taste for the adventuring life. And he can't risk losing her. Not again. But it’s not like he can tell her that; she'll get annoyed and accuse him of white-knighting at her again. So he lies and evades and breathes a sigh of relief when she stops questioning him and wishes him good luck.

Nate can tell she's angry whenever he comes back-- there's always a hug and a relieved “I'm glad you're all right,” but she's distant for a few days after his trips. He takes to picking up trinkets that remind him of her while he's out, little statues or rings that he thinks she'll like. He doesn't really know how else to tell her that he's doing this for her, that he's thinking of her, that he loves her.

She wears the rings and puts the statues on her bookshelf, so he guesses he's doing something right.

*

In keeping with their history, Elena ends up involved in one of Nate's jobs purely by accident. She's in Ireland covering the national elections; Nate does his disappearing act two days into the trip, and Elena swallows her anger and disappointment and does her damn job. She sends her crew off to the local pub and gets the stock location footage herself, distracting herself with dramatic pans across darkened streets and slow zooms on political signs.

It's during one of those slow zooms that she sees Nate and another man tearing down the street, hands inside their jackets in a very familiar about-to-draw pose; about ten seconds after Elena lowers the camera to stare at them, a dark sedan shoots around the corner and gives chase. The street they're on goes into a dead-end-- if Nate and his friend go down it, they'll be trapped. Elena's running towards the intersection before she can think about it. “Nate!” she shouts and waves the camera at him.

He looks over at her, and even at this distance she can tell he's shocked, but he turns hard and sprints toward her anyway. His friend follows and barely manages to avoid getting hit by the car. “What are you--” Elena starts as Nate approaches.

“No time run!” he says as he whips past. Elena rolls her eyes and chases after him, grinning in spite of herself. She'd never admit it, but she’s missed this.

The car comes after them quick enough, and Nate leads them into a narrow alley, then up a series of drainage pipes and window ledges to the roof of an abandoned warehouse. The three of them drop flat once they're up, listening as the car stops in the street below. The doors slam, and someone shouts, “Find them. They can't have gone far.”

Elena glances over at Nate and raises an eyebrow; he looks back and grins sheepishly. “I can explain,” he whispers.

“Uh-huh.”

The man on Nate's other side clears his throat quietly. “Charlie Cutter,” he says and holds out a hand over Nate's back.

“Elena Fisher.” Shaking hands in this situation is so unbelievably surreal that she has to bite her tongue to keep from laughing.

Charlie grins and elbows Nate. “So _this_ is Elena,” he says.

“Yeah.” Nate sighs with what sounds like fond exasperation. “This is Elena.”

They end up stuck on the roof for a solid thirty minutes while the people from the car search the streets. Elena uses the time to text her crew and tell them that she's going to be MIA for a few days; the election isn't until next week, and that's all the networks really care about, anyway. She ignores Nate's repeated pleas and requests to just go back to the hotel. Much to her surprise, Charlie takes her side, citing all the stories that Nate has apparently told him about her as evidence for why she should be allowed to join them. She's oddly flattered that Nate's been bragging about her to his friends. Going by the look on his face, though, Nate seems to be regretting it.

“Sounds like she'd be good to have around, is all,” Charlie says. “And you _were_ saying this job would be easier with three people.”

Nate sighs and buries his head in his folded arms. “Fine,” he says, voice muffled. “I give up. You two win.”

Elena and Charlie grin at each other, and she decides she likes the big, earnest Brit. They spend the next three days running around the city, the countryside, and eventually a ruined fortress on the coast, hunting for a stolen Incan relic that Nate and Charlie have been hired to return to a museum in Peru. They manage to reclaim the relic from the private collector _without_ blowing up the fortress, much to Elena's astonishment. She tells Charlie stories about all the things Nate's blown up on their previous adventures on the drive back to the city, while Nate protests his innocence in the back seat.

Nate and Charlie plan to leave the next morning to deliver the relic; Charlie goes off for celebratory drinks, and Elena barely manages to get the door of the hotel room locked before Nate's dragging her to the bed. It's the way they were months ago, after Nepal, laughing and breathless and comfortable with each other, none of the heavy tension of recent weeks looming over them. Elena thinks that maybe she should be worried about that, that maybe adrenaline rushes and brushes with death are all that's keeping them together, but then Nate starts kissing his way down her stomach and the ability for coherent thought vanishes entirely.

He's gone when she wakes up, but he signed his note “Love, Nate,” so she doesn't mind too much.

*

“I think I'm gonna ask Elena to marry me.”

Sully chokes on his beer, predictably; Nate had waited until the other man was taking a drink to make that announcement. He has to get his fun somehow.

“Seriously?” Sully chokes, coughing and blinking at him in surprise.

Nate shrugs and smiles crookedly. “Do you think I shouldn't?” Truth be told, he's halfway hoping Sully will talk him out of it. Let his cowardice be someone else's fault. The idea of marriage-- of commitment-- still terrifies him, but he told Elena he loves her and the world didn't end. He's hoping the same principle will apply to marriage. It's not like it'll change things that much between them, not really; they love each other, they spend majority of their time together, they more or less live together... It'll just be rings and a new tax bracket.

It's probably the scariest thing he's ever considered doing.

Sully has on his Serious Face, which Nate hasn't seen in years. It showed up a lot more when he was a kid and Sully was trying to teach him Important Life Lessons, but somewhere around age 17 he became more or less immune to it. “You love her?” Sully asks, holding Nate's gaze.

“Of course.” Nate's sort of proud of how quick he's able to answer. That's progress.

Sully stares at him for several long moments, long enough that Nate starts to get uncomfortable, but he makes himself hold the other man's gaze. Then Sully shrugs and looks away. “Just make sure I get an invite, kid,” he says. “And let me know if any of the bridesmaids are single.”

Nate grins and rolls his eyes. “You're a dirty old man.”

*

The wedding ends up being a stop on the way to the airport for their flight to Fiji. Neither of them has any family to invite, and their friends are scattered around the world. So Sully's their driver and their lone witness as they sign the papers and exchange rings.

It's still one of the best moments of Elena's life.

Nate's nervous, but he's happy; he's an awful liar, and Elena knows she'd be able to tell if he didn't want to be doing this. And he does. He wants to be married to her. She can't stop grinning as they walk back to the car, and the matching look on Nate's face just makes it that much better.

Sully drops them at the airport, and Elena's only a little surprised when he gives her a hug good-bye. “Be patient with him,” he says into her ear. “He's never done this before.”

“I know,” she says. “Thanks.”

The honeymoon in Fiji is fantastic. They spend a lot of time at the beach—Nate is _very_ appreciative of Elena’s bikinis—and even manage to explore a ruined fortress without anyone shooting at them or blowing the place sky-high. Nate tries to claim that he’s able to travel without explosions, but he gives up halfway through and admits that the lack of destruction is pretty remarkable.

But it’s only a week, and then they have to go back to the real world. Much as she hates to admit it, Elena’s nervous. She’s always known that Nate has problems with commitment; even though he was the one to propose, she still worries that he’ll panic and bolt.

A week goes by, then two, then a month. And it’s not like it’s all sunshine and rainbows—adjusting to actually living together takes some time, and Nate’s still evasive about his work—but it’s better. It's good, really, most of the time. Elena pushes him more for information when he runs off, and he seems more willing to tell her so long as she promises not to come after him. That’s fairly annoying, but at least he’s talking to her about it. It’s progress. And for a while, she actually believes that this will work.

*

Something’s wrong. Nate can’t quite put his finger on it, can’t give a name to it, but it’s a general sense of unease that clings to the back of his mind. He keeps prodding at it, like the mental version of a sore tooth, trying to figure out what the problem is.

They’re in Cairo, about four months after the wedding, and Nate’s got a lead on some ancient idols that a private collector in Iraq would like to see returned. It’s a good reason to break off from Elena’s scheduled trip; she’s heading to Istanbul the day after tomorrow, and Nate has no interest in going back to Turkey. Ever. She’s covering an OPEC press conference right now. Nate’s pretty sure he can pack his things and leave before she gets back.

He gathers his things from the bathroom and steps out into the hotel room just as Elena shuts the door behind her. Their eyes meet, and Nate freezes. Elena looks away first and sighs. “You don’t have to sneak out, you know,” she says and tosses her notepad on the dresser.

Nate winces, but heads for his bag anyway. “I probably won’t be gone long.”

Elena snorts. “You’re a terrible liar.”

“’lena--”

“Just tell me!” she snaps. “All I want to know is where you’re going and how long I should wait before I start calling your friends to find out if you’re dead.”

“It’s not dangerous. I’ll be fine.”

She sits down on the side of the bed. “And how am I supposed to believe that if you won’t tell me where you’re going?”

He scowls at that and yanks the zipper on his bag shut. “So I’m lying again?”

Elena doesn’t reply; she just folds her arms and raises an eyebrow, her lips pressed together in a thin line. And he is lying, sort of, because his work is always dangerous to some degree. Nate sighs and rakes a hand through his hair. “I’m going to Suez to get some relics back for a collector in Iraq,” he says. “Happy?”

Apparently not, going by the look on her face. “Does this involve going to Iraq?” she asks.

Nate shrugs. “Probably.”

Elena stares at him. “I’m sorry, how is a trip to Iraq _not_ dangerous?”

“Oh, for god’s sake—I’m barely going to be in the country twelve hours.” Probably. Assuming things go according to plan. “And are you _really_ lecturing me about running into war-torn countries? After you show up in Nepal--”

“Oh, yeah, Nepal’s a great example of safety for the two of us,” Elena cuts in. She looks away, her jaw clenched, and shakes her head. “I just wish you’d be a little choosier about these jobs, is all. Maybe wait for something less likely to get you killed.”

“You think I’m not being choosy already?”

“How would I know?” Elena glares at him. “It’s not like you tell me anything about what you do anymore.” Nate opens his mouth to argue, but she talks over him. “No, you know what, forget it. It’s not worth it.”

Nate pinches the bridge of his nose. “I’ve gotta go,” he mutters. “My train leaves in an hour.” And the part of him that always has to have the last word drives out the next comment. “I’ll try not to blow it up this time.”

Elena doesn’t exactly shudder, but she closes her eyes, her fingers clenching the comforter. He feels like an ass, but it’s already too late for apologies. “Be careful,” Elena says, her voice hollow.

“Yeah.” Nate picks up his bag and heads to the door. “I’ll call you when I’m on my way home.”

He’s halfway to the train station, seething and clinging to his sense of victimhood out of a perverse feeling of validation, when it all sort of clicks. That thing that’s been bothering him for so long suddenly comes into focus. He has been pickier about his work recently, turned down jobs that seemed too dangerous or would keep him away too long. Ignored the big mysteries that used to drive him. He closes a fist around the ring hanging from his neck. He’d been thinking about going after the big one again, after the whole mess in Nepal. Going after Marlowe and the mystery of the East Indies voyage. But he’s barely thought about that in months.

Nate’s never cared much for being what other people want him to be. The idea of changing himself, of sacrificing his identity, because someone else wants him to is horrifying. He's made himself who he is today, and he'll be damned if he lets that go. It's taken him too long to build up his identity, his reputation, to give it up now. This is who he is, and he's not changing for anyone. Not even her.

The ring’s biting into his palm, and he releases it as he crosses the street. As soon as he gets back to the States, he’s calling Sully. He’s let their oldest treasure sit for far too long.

*

It’s shocking, how quickly it all falls apart.

Nate disappears into his research, and Elena’s only able to find out what he’s investigating in bits and pieces, pulling information out of him like teeth. Sully fills in the gaps when tells he her the story about how he and Nate first met; Nate looks uncomfortable through the whole thing, and Elena wonders if he’d have ever told her on his own.

He’s done research for jobs before, but this is different. This is an obsession. “It’s been twenty years,” he says when she asks why he’s so focused on it now. “Twenty years I’ve let this go. That’s too long. I need to finish it.”

They share an apartment and a bed, but they’re spiraling out from each other. Entire days go by without them speaking to each other. Elena comes home most nights to find Nate hunched over his desk, hidden behind a miniature fortress of books, and she goes to bed well before him. One night, she sleeps at her office, just to see if he’ll react. There are no calls and no messages on her phone the next morning, and when she gets home that evening, her anger’s had a full day to stew.

“How long would I have to be gone before you noticed?” she snaps in the middle of the ensuing shouting match.

Nate just gives her a bitter, cruel smirk. “I assumed you had a perfectly good reason for not telling your husband that you wouldn’t be coming home,” he retorts.

The worst part of it is that it's the first time they’ve spoken for more than thirty seconds in four days.

She gets an assignment in Rio; Nate's always liked the southern hemisphere, so she assumes he'll be joining her. But when she tells him where they're going, he just smiles weakly and says he's gonna sit this one out. “I've got some things to take care of here,” he says. “Call me when you get there?”

She does. It goes to voicemail.

She's in Brazil for two weeks, and she calls him when she's on her way home. Nate sounds sleepy, like he just woke up, which doesn't make sense; L.A. is a few hours behind Rio. When she points this out, teasing, he sighs and admits that he's in London. “I should be home a few days after you,” he says, and Elena can't help but wonder if he'd have told her about this trip if he'd gotten home before her.

The whole thing feels horribly familiar. Just like last time, they’re falling apart. Elena knows that if something doesn’t change soon, she’s going to lose him. Even though it’s supposed to be different now. They love each other—they’re married, for god’s sake, that’s supposed to mean something. It’s supposed to keep them together.

So she tries to pull him out of it, tries to lure him away from his books and his laptop whenever she can. Sometimes it works and he’s actually present, mentally as well as physically, for a day or two. Once she even manages to convince him to go on a trip to Tokyo, and things are a little better while they’re away. But it doesn’t last. And it gets harder to take his attention off his obsession as the months go by.

A few months before their one-year wedding anniversary, and they’re on day three of another silent stretch. Elena stands in their living room, watching Nate scribble notes and flip through pages, and debates the merits of just going to bed. She doesn’t have the energy to drag him away or the stomach to put up with another rejection. But she misses him, dammit, so she walks over and puts her hand on the back of his neck anyway. “Come to bed, Nate,” she says. “It’s late.”

“Be there in a minute,” he says without looking up. “I just need to finish this one thing.”

Elena stares at him, then pulls her hand away and steps back. “Forget it,” she mutters. “I’ll see you in the morning.”

Nate exhales sharply and finally twists around to look at her. “I said I’d be just a minute,” he snaps.

“Oh, sorry, I wasn’t sure what kind of minute you meant,” Elena retorts, voice shaking with fury. “Is it the kind that lasts four hours? Or seven? Or is it the kind that involves flying off to Colombia in the middle of the night? You’ve got a lot of different ‘just a minutes’ here, Nate, so maybe you could clarify.”

He closes his book and turns around to face her. “What the hell do you want from me, Elena?”

“I want you to be a participant in this damned marriage!” she shouts. “Jesus Christ, Nate, you’ve barely said a word to me in three days. The only reason I know you’ve moved from that desk is because you’re wearing a different shirt. I am sick and tired of coming in second to your so-called ancestor!”

Something dark goes across his face, and he halfway raises his hand to the ring around his neck. “Elena, I’ve spent twenty years waiting for this,” he says. “I have to--”

“You didn’t give a damn about this until five months ago,” she interrupts. “I’d never even heard about Marlowe and this East Indies trip until you developed this—this obsession with it.”

“I’m not obsessed.”

Elena laughs bitterly. “Right. Well. I’d hate to see what obsession actually looks like, then.”

“Elena--”

“Look, what does it matter?” she asks. “It’s not about the treasure, it’s _never_ about the treasure for you. Even if you found a fortune, you’d keep doing this. Marlowe is probably long dead, or she’s lost the other half of the puzzle. And even if she isn’t, as long as you have that,” she points at the ring, “then she can’t solve the riddle either. You still win.”

Nate stares at her. “You want me to stop?” he asks, voice low.

Elena sighs. “I want you to come back,” she says. “And if that means giving this up, then… yes. I want you to stop.”

Several long, agonized seconds drag by. Nate’s hand closes around his ring. “I can’t do that,” he says. Then something sharpens in his gaze. “I won’t.”

“No. Of course not.” Elena closes her eyes for a moment, then turns and walks to the bedroom. And for the first time since her parents died, she cries herself to sleep.

When she wakes up the next morning, Nate’s gone. His desk is clear, his books and notes and laptop all missing. Dread coils up through her throat, choking her, as she checks the one new text message on her phone.

It’s four words from Sully. _Nate’s here. I’m sorry._

And just like that, they’re over.

*

Sully puts up with a lot those first couple days. Nate’s grateful for the spare bedroom and the free run of the liquor cabinet. And he’s glad that Sully doesn’t question him, doesn’t lecture him, doesn’t tell him he should go back.

The silent, judging looks do that enough without actually adding words to the mix.

His second night there, Nate’s drinking and sulking on the couch. Sully’s gone out—not surprising, really, even Nate doesn’t want to be around himself right now. So he just works his way through the better part of a bottle of whiskey and wonders where the hell everything went wrong. Why everything in his life is ruined eventually. And how long it’ll take before he drives Sully away, too.

Nate grimaces and reaches for the bottle. His ring clinks against the glass, and he stops, staring at it. All he can think of is the way Elena smiled at him when she slipped it on his finger that first time. He yanks it off and throws it at the wall; it makes a satisfying clinking sound when it hits the floor. Nate doesn’t bother looking to see where it’s fallen.

When he wakes up the next morning, head pounding and mouth dry, he scans the floor for any sign of the ring. There’s no tell-tale glint of sunlight on metal, though, and he looks away. It probably fell between the floorboards or something. Gone for good.

It’s for the best, he tells himself, and staggers off to take a shower.

*

A couple months after Nate leaves, Elena’s manager offers her a year-long contract in Yemen as one of the network’s Middle East correspondents. The pay’s good, there are plenty of travel opportunities, and it’s on the other side of the world from her too-empty apartment. Elena takes the job after less than a minute's consideration. She spends the next two weeks packing her life into boxes and putting everything in storage. She packs up Nate’s things, too, and doesn’t let herself think about why.

*

Nate’s a little surprised when Sully doesn’t kick him out and make him find his own apartment. But he’s not about to turn down such generosity, so he stays, slowly acquiring new clothes and covering the spare bedroom in maps and notes. He’s zeroing in on Marlowe after all these years, and for all the disapproving glances coming his way, he knows that Sully’s eager to settle this, too. He asks about Nate’s progress a little too often and lingers over the maps and notes when he thinks Nate’s not looking.

He and Sully are sitting on the couch one night about four months after he moved in. Sully’s watching the news, and Nate’s scrolling through old Usenet conversations for information about Drake’s voyages. It took him a while to accept, traditionalist that he is, but valuable information isn’t always found in dusty old tomes. Though he’s always happier when it is. The sound from the TV cuts out abruptly, and Nate glances up to see Sully fiddling with the remote. He glances at the screen and sees Elena, all serious and reporter-ly, standing in front of a nondescript mosque. His chest aches, and before he’s aware of it, Nate’s on his feet, laptop in hand, heading back to his bedroom.

“Kid--” Sully calls, but Nate ignores him. He needs a plan to get at Marlowe. He needs bait.

Nate brings Charlie in on the plan and buys tickets to London. He and Sully pick up suits when they land because, hell, if they’re gonna do this, they’re gonna do it with style.

*

She’s at her apartment, reading over news reports of a fire at a historic chateau in France with a twisting feeling in her stomach, when her phone rings. It’s Sully, and for a couple seconds, her heart stops. She hasn’t heard from him in months, not since his message the day Nate left. If he’s calling her now… She shuts her laptop and answers the phone. “Hey, Sully,” she says and hopes her voice isn’t shaking.

“Elena!” Sully sounds happy, and the tension in her chest eases up a little. He wouldn’t fake cheerfulness if he was about to tell her that Nate’s dead. “How’s my favorite foreign correspondent?”

Elena leans back against the couch. Now that she’s reasonably certain Nate’s fine, this phone call seems very suspicious. “Not bad,” she says. “How’re you?”

Sully just laughs. “Lonesome and foolish, my dear, as always,” he says. “Listen, I was wondering if you could help an old friend out.”

“Uh-huh.” She narrows her eyes at the wall. Months with no contact from either of them, and then Sully calls to ask for a favor. Of course.

Sully must be able to tell that the mood on the line has changed, because he sighs, and she can just picture him rubbing his forehead. “Nate and I need to get into Yemen without any questioning from authorities,” he says. “It’s important.”

Elena shakes her head. “And why, exactly, should I do this for you?” For Nate, is the more relevant question, but to say that would give away more than she’s comfortable with.

“You know how he is, Elena.” And Sully sees through her anyway. “If you don’t help us, he’ll start going down his list of less-reputable contacts in the area, and it’s gonna end with one of us selling organs on the black market.”

And knowing Sully, he’d probably be the one forking over a kidney to save Nate. Because Nate’s his son and Sully would do anything for him, two facts that Nate seems willfully oblivious to. Elena sighs. She could fight with him, but she already knows she’s going to give in. “Fine,” she says. “I’ll see what I can do. Give me a few days to pull some things together.”

Sully lets out an overwrought sigh of relief. “You are a lifesaver, Elena.”

That’s probably closer to the truth than either of them would like to admit. “Just don’t make me regret it when you land.”

“If I could promise you that, I would,” Sully replies. “I’ve gotta go—I’ll be in touch about the flight.”

“Hey, Sully?” Elena says before he can hang up.

“Yeah?” Sully prompts her when she doesn’t speak right away.

Elena bites her lip, hating herself for this weakness, then asks anyway. “How is he?”

There’s a long pause before he replies. “Fixated.”

All this time, and nothing’s changed. Elena closes her eyes and nods. “Right. I… I’ll talk to you later.”

“Take care, Elena.”

*

Nate thinks he’s leaning against the wall casually, which he knows means that he looks anything but. He tells himself not to jump up as soon as Sully comes into view—so naturally, he’s on his feet and all but bouncing towards the other man the instant he spots him. “So?” Nate asks.

Sully looks up at him and shakes his head. “She’s not gonna be happy to see you, kid,” he says.

“But she’s helping.”

“Yes.”

“That’s good, right?”

Sully sighs. “Look, Nate, just—don’t get your hopes up.”

“Hopes for what?” Nate asks, but Sully’s already walking away. Nate glances down at his left hand; the tan line from his ring is long since gone. There’s nothing left to prove that it was ever there. He reaches up to Drake’s ring instead and takes a deep breath. He has to see this through. No matter what.


End file.
